


Flatlands

by owlslide



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Angst, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-02
Updated: 2018-10-02
Packaged: 2019-07-24 00:10:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,429
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16169600
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/owlslide/pseuds/owlslide
Summary: 2012. Dan & Phil run away. you know why.written for the prompt "on the run" for Phandomficfests Bingolots of inspiration came from the song Flatlands by Chelsea Wolfe. highly suggest listening to it while you read <3warning: a sensitive topic within the phandom that I tried my very best to treat with the utmost respect. I hope it comes across that way.





	Flatlands

Phil’s stomach feels like it’s on the floor.

He’s aware that Dan’s speaking to him. Screaming, really. But he’s not comprehending anything that he’s trying to communicate; sound and thought is being filtered to a dull buzz in his head. He’s watching the features of Dan’s beautiful, young face contort with fear, his warm chocolate eyes wide and spilling tears down his cheeks. Phil can’t help but notice how young he looks right now - how completely unprepared to deal with something like this. He wants to reach out and touch him, try to provide him some semblance of comfort. He wants to more than anything.

It wouldn’t help. Not now.

It might make things worse.

 

He feels stupid, like this whole thing could’ve been easily prevented if he took it more seriously months before. He could have taken it down then, but it didn’t seem important at the time. Maybe he should’ve taken it down right after Dan saw it. They could watch it again from the saved file on Phil’s computer if Dan felt like it. But it just… seemed easier to leave it up. That way, Dan could watch it whenever he wanted.

Phil never anticipated the possibility of the video being leaked. Especially not because of a freak Youtube glitch.

 

He feels like he broke Dan’s trust by not considering that this might happen. By even uploading it to Youtube in the first place. It was only ever meant for his and Dan’s eyes - a simple, but heartfelt gift for a boy who said he didn’t need anything extravagant. And it had been turned into a wrecking ball, smashing through the foundation of their relationship. Fear twists sickeningly in Phil’s stomach as he watches his boyfriend spill every thought and tear within him, his long arms gesturing frantically. He’s standing not two feet away from Phil, but it feels like he’s slipping further and further away. And Phil can’t move. He can’t reach out to stop it.

He looks past Dan’s tear-stained face out the window behind him. The late afternoon September sun shines in, amber light bouncing against the floor of their new lounge and casting a low, warm glow around Dan.

He’s shaking.

Phil’s eyes follow one giant tear as it rolls down his smooth cheek and falls into a pool of sunlight on the ground. Transfixed, he watches it soak into the fibres of the rug (their rug) and disappear.

He’s standing there, staring into that spot on the floor, as Dan’s voice floats back into comprehension.

 

“... and I can’t even go on the internet to distract myself, because people will just keep harassing me!” Dan’s chokes, his shoulders shaking with barely contained sobs. “They don’t deserve to know ANYTHING about me anymore!”

Phil feels like his heart is being sucked out by a vacuum. He can't do anything except watch as his Dan falls apart under the stress of thousands of prying eyes, searching for things they are not entitled to know.

And a quiet, horrible voice in the back of his head tells him over and over that it’s his fault.

 

Dan hasn’t actually said the words “I blame you for this”, but Phil can’t shake the feeling that he’s thinking it. _And he would be right to_ , the voice calls, and the thought echoes through every cavern of his brain.

He wants to make it right. He has to.

Somehow.

 

“What can I do?” Phil’s voice comes out wavering. He hasn’t spoken in a long time. The sound of his voice almost startles him.

“I don’t know,” Dan shakes his head at the ground, eyes brimming with fresh tears. “I don’t know, Phil. I wish we could just disappear.”

Phil’s heart sinks to somewhere by his kneecaps, but from within the sadness swirling through him, he clings to one thing.

 

We.

Dan said _we_.

Despite the turmoil of this stupid, invasive thing happening to them… Dan still wants Phil. Right there next to him.

Phil pulls himself from the hole of dissociative despair that he’s been struggling to escape since Dan started crying. He knows what he needs to do now.

 

“Ok. Let’s go.”

Dan sniffs, but his tears stop. “Wha’dyou mean?”

“Let’s disappear.”

Dan stares at Phil through wide, red, wet eyes. His shock at Phil’s words has stilled his body; he stands motionless as Phil looks back at him with soft eyes, calm as the middle of the ocean on a misty morning, a sad smile tugging at his lips.

 

Not one hour later, they’re leaving their apartment, lightly packed backpacks slung over shoulders, with sunlight sinking down into the cracks and crevices of the city around them. A brief discussion points them westbound; Dan mentions that he wants to be close to the ocean. One way train tickets are purchased and ripped in half, and then Dan and Phil are hurtling away from the station... from their brand new home, from Manchester. From everything they know.

They’re seated towards the back of a near deserted train car, the rumbling of forward movement shaking them gently as they speed towards the sea. Phil glances over at Dan, eyes raking over his features. His tears have dried, reduced to faint tracks on his golden skin. Dan’s staring out the window into the inky blackness of night, dotted with flecks of light zooming past. Phil’s staring at the small constellation of freckles over the rosy patch on Dan’s cheek.

The inexplicably magnetic pull of eyes on him drags Dan’s gaze from the window, and it lands on Phil. Phil offers a small, crooked smile, which Dan returns. Both expressions are twinged with a hint of something unspoken, mutually known but perhaps not fully understood yet. Dan peeks over the headrests of the seats ahead of them, and sees no one. He slips his hand into Phil’s without a word.

 

They reach the coast about an hour later. They’re close enough to the beach that they can hear the relentless roar of the ocean faintly behind the closed door of their motel room. Almost exactly the moment they shut the heavy weighted door on the unfamiliar parking lot outside, Dan’s eyes mist over with fresh tears. He drops his bag carelessly in the middle of the room and collapses on one of the double beds, curling in on himself. The other bed remains vacant as Phil sits carefully beside him, pained and unsure. He brings a hand to Dan’s shoulder and squeezes… and Dan turns the opposite direction, his back to Phil.

Phil looks at his shoes, and they grow blurry as his own tears begin to fall. He listens to Dan’s sniffles and reminds himself with a shaky breath that time heals everything. Maybe one day this will all seem like a bad dream, a distant chapter in their lives. The wounds will fade to scars and they won’t hurt anymore. He hopes with everything in him that it’s true as he starts to stand.

“Wait.”

 

Phil whips around to face Dan. He’s still turned away, his figure still. There’s a pause... then a request, barely whispered.

“... Please stay.”

 

A large hand reaches back blindly and its fingers entangle in Phil’s, then he’s being pulled back onto the bed. Dan brings both of their hands to his chest as Phil fits himself snugly against Dan’s back.

They stay like that for a long time, until Dan’s distressed tears stop and exhaustion carries him to sleep. Phil gets up only long enough to remove both of their shoes, then slots himself in behind Dan again. He listens to the far away rumble of waves and Dan’s steady breathing and clings to Dan tight as he drifts off to sleep.

 

He dreams of bright lights illuminating a crowded theatre and unknown places with beautiful old buildings. Of American pancakes, fuzzy critters in Australia, cherry blossoms in Japan. Of scribbles in the shape of the words Dan and Phil scrawled on endless surfaces.

Dan is with him. His hair is curly and he’s older. He turns to Phil and flashes him a stunning, dimpled smile with a confidence that Phil has only seen in his waking life once or twice. He reaches for Phil’s hand and Phil can feel his fingers intertwined in Dan’s.

“Good things are coming,” Dan says, his voice velvety and mature. “Just hold on.”

 

When sunlight filters through the closed curtains and the across the beds, one vacant, one not, Phil wakes with a feeling like everything is going to be okay.

 

It’s just going to take some time.


End file.
